Wednesday night Chucktown’s brightest gathered at Joe Riley Stadium for the best party of the year: City Paper’s Best of Charleston party. And I’m not just saying that because I work for the City Paper. There are some incredible events that happen in this town, but nothing compares to the diverse crowd at BOC. The party wasn’t filled with people who had enough money to spend on tickets. The (free) party was populated with all of the people that you — our readers — voted as the best in town. Representatives from everywhere from the best wine bar to the best news station to the best band were there, though many were barely recognizable as they were sporting mustaches. Five Guys (best burger), Wasabi (best sushi/Japanese), Santi’s (best Mexican), Nirlep (best Indian), and Chai’s/Basil (best lots of things) kept the food coming, while upstairs the Firefly folks presented all of the awesome new vodka flavors (while a shivering blonde posed for pictures on a tire swing). The Lowcountry High Rollers skated around the party passing out staches and looking hot in pink fishnets. Plainfield Project, Plane Jane, Dangermuffin, and Leslie kept the place rockin’ from out on the field, while revelers took their turns drinking American Honey shots from out of the mustache ice luge. Maybe it was all the people, or the heaters, or just the facial hair, but we kept pretty warm despite the low temps. When the party closed down, many headed to Best New Bar the Recovery Room to keep things going until late in the night. Congratulations, best of the best. Keep doing what you do, and hopefully we’ll see you next year. —EJ

Check out more pics from our Flickr feed here!

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Photographer Jonathan Stout also has some great shots on his site.

Amy Polston came through with some more good pics

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Best of Charleston Party 2009 from Charleston City Paper on Vimeo.

And lastly, here’s a video that we put together from last night.

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